K I L L E R
by Galbinus-Rayquaza
Summary: Eighteen-year-old Damion lives in a messed-up world, where nightmares are tangible reality and hopes are laughable dreams, and his head is wanted by the Devil. Slight AU; Pokemon exist; minor to mild Twinleafshipping & Ikarishipping & PMS
1. JUST DIE!

**K. I. L. L. E. R.  
**by Galbinus

**Chapter One: JUST DIE!**

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A ribbon of emerald blood twisted down the supple crimson flesh of the demon, conspicuous as white against black.

Damion surveyed the damage with an impassive expression etched onto his young face. The demon lay twitching on the cement ground, drowning in its pool of green, claws drenched with Damion's dark red blood, hardening even as Damion watched with his cold amber eyes.

It was dying—Damion knew that; he could taste it—life was lingering in the air, unwilling to leave its host to move onto the hellish next world that awaited it.

Sighing, Damion leaned back against the wall, feeling the cool brick against his warm neck and inhaling the night air, desperately trying to ignore the smell of blood that permeated it, trying to think of tomorrow—where there would be no bloodshed, no harm done; a field of tender clovers for him to run in; or so Damion foolishly promised himself, like he did, every time.

The demon gave an incoherent grunt of words; dark green blood gushed from its mouth, for his throat would not work, for Damion had slit it.

"Die, you bastard." Damion spat, inexplicable vengeance and hatred welling up inside of him. He hated how the demon still lived, still struggled for life, despite the many fatal blows—at least, for any ordinary human—Damion had inflicted upon him. "_JUST DIE!_"

In a surge of blind adrenaline, Damion lifted his silver dagger and slammed it into the second heart of the demon.

A beautiful fountain of green blood arced through the air.

As the demon's movements ebbed away until its entire body desisted in its struggle for survival, Damion collapsed on his knees, and cried.

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**R. E. V. I. E. W. C. R. I. T. I. C. I. Z. E.**

Chapter lengths will vary.

**Pokémon © Satoshi Tajiri  
Story © Galbinus**

**Do not redistribute**


	2. Prepare for Work

**K. I. L. L. E. R.  
**by Galbinus

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**2. Prepare for Work **

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Golden sunlight streamed in through the blinds, hitting the open eyes of Damion Pearl Haste.

He blinked, unaccustomed to the excessive lighting, as the dwindling flame from a nearby candle provided him with ample. Instinctively, he rose, and dusted his bare shoulders.

Ambling tiresomely over to the ovular full-length mirror that hung, almost shamefully, on the wall adjacent to his unmade bed, Damion observed with disgust his reflection. Though not of the 'hairy' line, his jaw was suffering from being unshaven and it looked very much like he had not touched a razor for weeks, which he did not. His straw-colored hair was as unruly as ever, and as Damion apprehensively ran a callused hand through it, he flinched in pain as he forcibly tugged through many insistent tangles.

He sighed as he noted that he had not acquired a single new muscle on his wiry but ridiculously skinny frame. He had not since thirteen, when his puberty growth sprout had decidedly ended and left him bereft of height over that of his embarrassingly short five foot five.

"So be that way," He mumbled to himself underneath his breath, stoutly walking over to his drawer, where he extracted his usual outfit of flamboyant-collared striped T-shirt and long brown jeans. Pulling on both articles of attire, he glanced at the silver wristwatch he wore perpetually on his left hand and found that he was late for work. Again.

"Well, just fuck Coach Brawly. He doesn't have to fucking slay demons in the middle of the fucking night," Damion said self-righteously, though inwardly he shuddered at the prospect of being yelled by his bulky coach, who had a voice more flexible than the flightiest of stewardesses.

Grumbling, Damion pulled his long green scarf off from a nearby hook on the wall and wrapped it three times around his neck. Despite this, the two ends of the scarf still swung by his knees, but he did not mind too much.

He walked over to the cramped bathroom of his apartment building, where several Rattata were making themselves comfortable on the floor. Mercilessly, he stepped on their tails, and they scuttled off into a sizeable hole to Damion's right.

Sighing again, he turned on the faucet and waited his mandatory ten seconds before a stream of dark yellow water exploded out of the end. He waited a further ten seconds before the dirty water eventually diluted into clearness, then splashed his haggard face with it and reveled in the coolness.

Extracting a towel from the cabinet underneath the sink, Damion mopped his face and felt a new man.

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**Comments, Critiques, Curses? – Review. **

Additionally, I apologize for the shortness of this chapter as well as its predecessor. I will endeavor to make future ones longer.

**Pokémon, Pokémon characters © Satoshi Taijiri  
Story © Galbinus **

**Do not redistribute. **


	3. Work

**KILLER: CHAPTER 3  
**by Galbinus

**CHAPTER NAME: A DAY AT WORK  
CHAPTER RATING: T—MILD LANGUAGE  
****NEW FACES ALERT**

As Damion stepped out of the taxi, throwing a few dollars at the driver and saying, "Keep the change," he wondered exactly how his coach would react to him showing up to work two hours late.

Of course, he had gotten away with some stuff before, but, the blonde thought as he nervously pulled at his green scarf, perhaps Coach Brawly would be less merciful this time around. It was a good thing that Damion had been so considerate (of his mortality) as to bring a couple of white cotton puffs for earplugs. Hopefully, against his pallid, chalky-white skin, his makeshift earplugs would not be conspicuous enough as to draw attention from his somewhat short-sighted coach.

A homeless pauper, shaking coins in a tin can, turned his face—browned by dirt—to survey Damion, who paused in his brisk stride to the company tower to look down at the hobo.

"Spare some change?"

Without a moment of hesitation, Damion dug out two dollar bills from the right pocket of his khaki pants. As he was handing them to the destitute, he suddenly realized that those two bucks were his lunch money, but did not retract his donation.

"Thanks, man," The hobo said, grinning to reveal two rows of yellow teeth. Damion flashed a toothless smile and continued on his walk. Too tired from the ordeal of the previous night, Damion did not think it necessary to sprint to his office, which he would usually do on the surprisingly un-rare days he was late.

Smoke-thronged urban air gave way to dry artificially-produced oxygen as Damion stepped through the sliding doors of the steel-plated tower. His colleagues were many and busy, garbed in boring shades of varying gray. As he normally felt, Damion favored the comparison that he was a dandelion in a field of dead grass; or, perhaps a splash of color in black ink.

"You're LATE, Haste." A deep, forbidding voice growled. Trying his best not to flinch, Damion pivoted and found himself staring straight at the sweaty stomach of none other than Coach Brawly.

It was then that Damion realized he should have fabricated a plausible lie to account for his tardiness long before he even got into the taxi.

"That would be because, uh," Damion said. Instinctively, his right hand rose to nervously readjusting his scarf. The air seemed ten degrees warmer. "I was, uh. . . helping the kids at the local orphanage. . . yeah. . ." As an afterthought, he added, "Sir."

The blue eyes of the normally hospitable middle-aged man darkened further. As if to humiliate Damion, Brawly pressed, "Which orphanage _was_this, Haste?"

"The. . . local one." Damion lied.

"Which local one? Please, elaborate."

"He was with me," A familiar female soprano voice said. Damion could feel the beads of sweat which had formulated on his face evaporating. His hands relaxed, and he dropped the two cotton balls he had been holding in his right hand onto the ground, and heard it land. "We were at the Red Heart one on Seventy-Ninth Street."

Brawly's thick eyebrows rose, almost touching his the bang-less roots of his mass of spiked cerulean hair. Clearly, Damion's life being saved by the new arrival was the last thing he had expected.

"Thank you so much, Dawn," Damion whispered under his breath as his fellow employee brushed past him in a whirl of dark blue hair. He smelled pine needles and coffee, and wished he were in a sylvan Starbucks, preferably somewhere in northern Russia or southern Alaska.

In a nuance subtler than the maneuvering of a forest cat, Dawn touched Damion's hands with her own cool finger. Amazingly, Damion noted that, compared to the shade of Dawn's skin, he seemed extremely tan in comparison.

"Well, if you say so, Ikari. . ." Brawly said, trailing off hesitantly. Damion decided it was wise to not give the volatile-personality a chance to eat his words, and, grabbing Dawn's hand, streaked up the flight of stairs, careful not to let his adrenal imbalance trigger his Ability. Unfortunately for Damion, however, Brawly had thought to call out, "I will be expecting that you show up there this night at seven!"

Damion made it a priority to groan.

He looked around himself, and located Dawn's conspicuous, pink-wallpapered cubicle with ease. By then Dawn had taken her hand away from Damion's grip.

"Dawn. . ." He began, reprimanding. His playful tone of voice impeccably veiled the true panic that was growing inside of him.

"Oh, shush, Damion," Dawn said, returning the light-heartedness with a mock scowl. "It's about time you actually did some charity work anyway. Perhaps your being late was a blessing in disguise."

She leaned forward and tightened a frilly pink bow that she had tied around a stack of official-looking documents. Damion raised an eyebrow, forgetting his fear for a few moments. Trust Dawn to be perfectly fastidious of anything related to visual appeal.

"Besides, Damion, nobody really knows what you do after dark, anyway," Dawn continued, insinuating a more-or-less humorous tone to their informal conversation. Despite the obvious fact that the blue-haired woman was not taking the talk seriously, Damion could not help but feel a knot tighten in his stomach.

Trying his best not to let his voice tremble, Damion said, "B-But Dawn. . ."

"Would you like some coffee, Dae?" Dawn suddenly interrupted, a steaming Styrofoam cup of milk-enhanced latte held out to Damion in her right hand. Not so surprised at the invitation, which was daily, Damion accepted it, despite that he normally did not, and, nodding in thanks, took a small sip as Dawn continued. "Nobody believes your excuse of 'bowling with friends I met last Tuesday', you know."

Sincerely, Damion was a little surprised. He thought that the lie of his Dawn had brought up was impenetrable. "I _do _bowl, too."

Dawn snorted loudly, and made a motion with her left wrist as if she were preparing to falsify Damion's rebuttal. Luckily for Damion, at that precise moment Brawly had decided to announce something.

"Listen up, y'all!" The blue-haired man barked, his naturally loud voice surmounting the quiet office chatter that died down with his first word. "I want Haste, Mao, Ketchum, Tekan, and that intern whose name I forgot—"

"My name's Maple, sir, Max Maple," The short teenage boy quivered, timidly raising a shaky white hand above the wall of an office stall. His tidy crop of cobalt hair was just visible. Damion suppressed a genuine smirk; the intern worked his ass off every day (ironically, kissing ass) and it brought a vindictive smile to the blonde's face to see him getting forgotten. On the same topic, at times Damion wondered why Max flattered the bosses at every possible opportunity, considering that his older sister held a respectable position in the sports firm.

"Yeah, whatever, punk," Brawly said off-handedly, clearly not caring. His slight Virginian accent was strange molding around the city slang. "Oh, and I want Sketchit."

Damion frowned as the called people concentrated around the tall coach. He approached them warily, as he too was named, but all the while he could not help but wonder why Brawly would require the assistance of the Arts Director, Tracey Sketchit. Presently, however, Damion's question was answered without him ever asking.

"We're meetin' with Brendan Birch," Brawly said, and the eavesdropping female employees gasped with recognition at the name. Damion thought it was vaguely familiar but could not place a finger on it. "You know, the fashion guy."

"He's not just a fashion guy!" An indignant female voice, soprano inflection distinct, sounded. Damion recognized it at once as May Maple, the Assistant Art Director and Treasurer (for some reason, though, ever since her joining the company the firm funds had been steadily decreasing every year, though this financial decay could be attributed to factors other than May's poor mathematical abilities). "He's a professional clothes designer for women's wear. He owns his own line of clothes, you know."

"Of course you would know," Brawly said, rolling his eyes, and brushed the coquettish female aside with an empty threat of 'salary cut'. "Anyway," Brawly said as they walked through the back doors and approached the black-pebbled track that occupied a foot-ball sized space behind the company building, "He's coming over to help us design a uniform for the Pokés."

Almost instantly, Lucas Mao, a twenty-year-old man who appeared dim-witted at first glance, began to complain, "But I thought we didn't _need_a uniform. I mean, it's not like we're entering an actual tournament or whatever. You always said that it would 'impose upon our funds', or whatever that means."

"Know your _place, _damn it, Mao," Brawly shot back with equal irritability. Personally, Damion shared the blue-haired coach's frustration, though being a good friend of Lucas's, the blonde wished Brawly would not be so harsh on relatively timid Lucas. As quickly as he had started the brief argument, Lucas quieted embarrassingly. "Anyway, as it so happens, we have been accepted ter an actual tournament. Like, not somethin' small. The whole of Jubilife's competin' in this contest."

Damion, who had been silently sipping his coffee through Brawly's whole speech, coughed and spluttered, brown liquid spewing from his lips and staining his striped shirt. Brawly, being Brawly, gave neither sign nor indication of any kind that he had heard Damion's more-than-slightly distracting display. Used to Brawly's stoic reception of any unintentional disruptions, 

the rest of the Pokés had not reacted either, and Damion was left to mopping up his spill with his own scarf.

However, though the Pokés may not have been sidetracked by Damion's accident, the words that had just left Brawly's mouth were cause enough for conversation. Excited, nervous whisperings broke out among the employees; and understandably so.

"All right, all right, be quiet y'all," Brawly grunted, though not altogether displeasingly. Damion heard unfamiliar approaching footsteps and presently turned in the direction of the noise, which was coming through the swinging doors in the back of the building. Everyone else noticed, too, and as a tall figure garbed completely in night-black stepped outside, emanating an air of austerity, the chatter once again started. Brawly was too distracted to shush it this time.

The man spotted the group quickly and hurried towards them. As he came closer, Damion swept his chocolate gaze over the new arrival, drinking in his appearance: a thin face, rounded cheekbones, jet-black hair, feline ruby eyes, gangly frame, and a pink umbrella clutched in his right hand.

"Hi everyone!" The man squawked in a zesty tenor voice, waving his pink umbrella excitably. Damion immediately looked away from the figure and tried to see if someone else was coming. It would emotionally impale him if their fashion designer was this. . . man. "I'm Brendan Birch, as you might know!"

"Heya," Brawly said, extending a hand in greeting. Brendan primly accepted the handshake with one gloved hand. The Pokés exchanged uncertain looks. "I would be Brawly Brawls. Er, would this be your first time designing outfits for an athletic team?"

"Yes, yes it would!" Brendan said, "I'm really excited about the whole thing. I mean, it's not like my first time designing _clothes_or anything, but like, for something other than girls, I'm really up to the challenge!" Just for good measure, the idiosyncratic man added a girlish squeal to emphasize his enthusiasm.

Brawly smiled—not his usual genuine grin, but an incredibly reluctant facsimile of one. Brendan beamed back with vigor, perennially twirling his umbrella in his hand.

"Err," Tracey injected hesitantly after a silence of a few seconds, "I'm the Arts Director, Mr. Birch, so if you want to discuss aesthetics, well, I'm the man for that job."

Damion breathed a sigh of relief as Brendan skipped away with Tracey ambling awkwardly after. Brawly soon dismissed the group to practice. Unappreciative of the humid vernal weather of 

the equatorial city, Damion walked to the center of the grassy field and watched the other athletes train.

Ash Ketchum, a Kanto native with a rather stocky build, was practicing his sprinting ability as his thick ankles inherently disadvantaged him. Damion admired the black-haired man's persistence, as though Ash was physically challenged to a certain extent, lacking in the springy tendons of Jim Tekan and the high calf muscles of Damion, or even the slim limbs of Lucas Mao, all of which were traits beneficial to any professional runner. Yet he had fiery willpower that exceeded all of them, and was daunting at times as well. Though dumber than even Lucas at times, Ash Ketchum was a man who never wavered at the sight of a challenge.

Directing his attention away from the training Kantoan, Damion decided that it was best just to take the day off. For some reason, the Ability level in his bloodstream felt higher than usual; he was unsure of the stimulant. Excessive emotional stress sometimes triggered the phenomenon, but the most taxing obstacle he had encountered that day was the irritatingly feminine Brendan Birch being assigned as their uniform designer, and something as minute as that definitely did not qualify as 'excessive emotional stress'.

He considered consulting his Trainer about the problem, but decided that the issue was not significant enough to hassle the busy character with. Of course, Damion thought with a pint of arrogance, his innate skill, coupled with his Ability, was enough to set interregional records, but revealing his Ability to the outside world could not only prove fatal, but the prospect itself was laughable.

"I'm taking the day off," Damion said to Lucas, who was jogging by on the track, stuffing his large hands inside the pockets of his khaki jeans. The dark-haired man raised a quizzical eyebrow but said nothing, continuing on his run.

Deciding that he wanted to avoid Dawn, who would no doubt bombard him with loud urges to get back to his training, Damion took the long way around the building, passing the garbage dump.

Pulling his sleek black mobile phone out of his pocket, Damion flipped it open with professional finesse and punched in a terse text message to Dawn that he would meet her at the Red Whatever Orphanage at seven o'clock sharp.

Taking off his sneakers, Damion felt the sharp bumps in the cement with the thick soles of his bare feet. Tucking one shoe in each pocket, he inhaled and headed for the outskirts of town, not attracting any attention from the nonexistent passerby, as it was work hours.

He was going to do some real training.

**Author's Notes:**

I hope that you enjoyed this chapter slightly more than the others, despite the fact that it didn't have any real action in it.

The newly introduced characters, as well as Damion himself, will be explained more fully and fleshed out more completely over the course of the next chapters. You will also be meeting a very important character in the next chapter, which will describe Damion and Dawn's visit to the orphanage and an event that occurs immediately thereafter.

Many plot elements will also be explained in the next chapter, and for the sake of secrecy, I will not be discussing them in this A/N.

Also, you will have noticed that I downgraded the rating of this story to a 'T'. This is because I really feel that nothing has become extremely explicit (yet), so it will most likely stay like this until we hit the first anticlimax. To my more usual readers and reviewers, the next story that will be updated is _definitely _Natural Disturbances.

Nevertheless, I do wish that you would review. I have noticed that my reviewers have depleted quite a bit after my some two-month-long hiatus from FFnet since the beginning of this year, which saddens me. 

**Pokémon © Satoshi Tajiri  
Story © Galbinus**

**Do not redistribute without permission**


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